


the hierophant

by oryx



Category: Danball Senki
Genre: Alternate Universe - Soulmates, M/M
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2013-09-27
Updated: 2013-09-27
Packaged: 2017-12-27 17:54:50
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,776
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/981893
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/oryx/pseuds/oryx
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It was so much easier to renounce the whole "soulmates" business before he met his own.</p>
            </blockquote>





	the hierophant

**Author's Note:**

> i thought to myself "oh, i know, i'll write one of those cute 'your soul mate's name is written on your arm' tropefics"  
> but then it turned into some kind of... deconstruction, almost?? yeah i don't really know either

The name on the inside of his left wrist is written in Japanese, and Hanzou knows he’s fortunate.

 

Most people have foreign names. Tetsuo’s is French-sounding – Sabine – but she might not even live in the vicinity of France. She could be American, or Canadian. She could live in Haiti for all they know. But perhaps in the end it doesn’t matter, as Tetsuo seems content just to think about Sabine, often wondering aloud about her smile or the colour of her hair, her favorite foods and favorite movies and if she likes LBX. There is never any longing in his voice when he speaks of her. Just simple, mild-mannered curiosity, the kind you’d expect from a person who expects very little.

 

Rico’s is written in Chinese. “Xi Teng,” she says, and gets annoyed whenever someone mispronounces it. She tries to play it cool, but there are times when Hanzou catches her writing the name in her notebook over and over again, trying as best she can to spell it out in katakana. Sometimes she’ll scribble her own name beneath it and draw an awkward heart around the two. China isn’t so far away, after all. Massive and imposing, certainly, but not by any means unreachable. Just a small stretch of ocean between here and there, and in Rico’s eyes there is a hopeful glint that says “maybe someday.”

 

Kinji’s is written in Russian. Tatyana, it apparently reads, and when asked about it he usually just shrugs.

 

“Not like I’ll ever meet her,” he says. “And with my luck she probably wouldn’t be into me.”

 

They all laugh at this, but the sound rings hollow. Because that’s what everyone is most afraid of, isn’t it? Being unwanted, even by the one person in the world who’s meant for you. Meeting them after years and years of searching only to find disinterest (or worse, disappointment) in their eyes. It’s the stuff of nightmares, though none of them dare to speak their fears aloud.

 

The name on his dad’s wrist is in Korean. Hanzou doesn’t know how to pronounce it. His old man’s only ever talked about it once, years ago, when he was drunk out of his mind and vaguely incoherent. He’d tucked six-year-old Hanzou into bed with the story of how he dropped out of highschool at seventeen. How he’d sold his motorcycle for a one-way plane ticket to Seoul. How he could’ve sworn he saw _her_ on a busy street corner, but by the time he ran after her she had already vanished into the crowd.

 

How beautiful she’d been in that single, fleeting glance.

 

The name on the inside of his left wrist is written in Japanese, and Hanzou knows he’s fortunate.

 

.

 

.

 

When he was a child, it was only the adults who looked at him enviously.

 

But now that he’s in junior high, surrounded by teenage hearts occupied with thoughts of romance, his classmates are gradually beginning to do the same. They glare at him when they think he isn’t watching. They whisper behind their hands. “Why _him_?” “It’s not fair.” “Why does some delinquent loser get a Japanese name? Mine’s in fucking _Arabic_.”

 

It pisses him off, because it’s not like he asked for this. Honestly he’d much rather be like everyone else, staring at some foreign name on his arm and knowing that his chances of ever finding them are slim. With a Japanese name it’s like he’s always on edge, always nervous, always wondering if he might’ve missed them at the train station, passed by them on the street. What if they live nearby? What if they frequent the same places he does, just at different times and different days? These ‘what if’s linger constantly in the corners of his mind, sinking their teeth in and refusing to let go. It’s so rare, for two soulmates to meet. A miracle when it happens, people say. So shouldn’t he be out looking for them? Shouldn’t he be trying harder?

 

He takes to skipping school more often. Not like there’s much for him there anyhow, even without his classmates’ jealous stares burning the back of his neck. He tries to just forget it all – the name on his arm and the stress tied into it. Fights are a good way to go about it. Doesn’t have to think about anything when he’s smashing some kid’s face in, adrenaline thrumming hot beneath his skin. (If they want to call him a “delinquent loser,” then fuck, might as well live up to their expectations.)

 

But no matter how hard he tries to put it all aside, his heart still skips a beat whenever he hears that name. There’s a kid in class 3B with it – surname Namikawa, short-cropped hair and a nice smile, athletic and well-liked. Hanzou has English at the same time Namikawa has Gym, and inevitably his eyes are always drawn down to the field below, attention caught by the shouts of Namikawa’s friends.

 

“Daiki, pass the ball over here!”

 

“Get a homerun for me, Daiki-kun!”

 

Namikawa Daiki isn’t his soulmate. Hanzou knows this for a fact. There’s no jolt when he looks at him, no sudden moment of clarity, and the name on Namikawa’s arm spells out “Sarah” in blocky Western letters. But all the same, every time he hears someone call that name something twists painfully inside him, fingers inadvertently reaching over to trace those three characters on his wrist.

 

だいき

 

.

 

.

 

He’s not sure when he starts to hate the “real” Daiki – this guy he doesn’t even know but who’s probably some kind of asshole, because Hanzou’s been waiting fourteen years for him and he’s _still_ not here.

 

But once he does, once he destroys all notions of ever finding his soulmate and living a happy, contented life with them like all the movies say he should… That’s when he feels a wonderful sense of relief. It’s like a weight has been lifted from his shoulders. He and the Devas get in fights with some kids from the south side of town, and he imagines it’s Daiki he’s kicking in the ribs, Daiki whose jaw just cracked beneath his fist. Hakai-O rips its enemies to shreds without mercy, and he imagines it’s Daiki’s LBX he’s tearing apart piece by piece, Daiki who sinks to his knees in utter defeat across the diorama.

 

It’s cathartic, taking all his anger out on someone, even if that someone is little more than a figment of his imagination. Hanzou finds himself smiling, really and truly, for the first time in a long while. He doesn’t need Daiki. Not in _that_ way, at least. And all the people around him who look at him with envy in their eyes can go shove it. Soulmates? What a fucking joke. More like a ploy to keep people quiet, to keep them sad and lonely, to keep them dreaming of some unattainable reality until the end of their days. The whole thing’s probably a conspiracy, he says to the Devas, and they stare at him wide-eyed and wary.

 

“I dunno, Leader,” Rico says softly. She’s still clinging to the idea of Xi Teng. “Remember those soulmates on the news the other day? The ones who met online? They seemed pretty legit.”

 

“My aunt and uncle are soulmates,” Tetsuo chimes in. “I’ve seen their names on each other’s arms and everything. Uncle moved here from Taiwan just to find her.”

 

Even Kinji, the eternal pessimist, seems unconvinced by Hanzou’s theory, and eventually Hanzou just huffs out a sigh and gives up. Let them live in their silly little soulmate dream world if they want. Let them keep fantasizing about some person they’ll never know. But him? He’s done. He’s done with the whole damn thing.

 

One day Kinji shows up at the Devas HQ with an angry set to his features.

 

“Some new kid’s been encroaching on our territory,” he says. “He’s apparently a hotshot over at Hakushuu Middle. Been beating everyone’s asses in fights and in LBX battles, too. Calls himself ‘The Magician in the Box’ or some shit, I don’t know. Either way he’s pissing me off. You wanna take him out, Leader?”

 

Hanzou laughs. “The Magician in the Box? The fuck kinda nickname is that?” He runs a hand along the edge of his bokken, frowning thoughtfully. He’s in the mood for a good brawl – when is he not? – but is this Magician asshole even worth his time? Nobody’s been able to challenge him lately. Strange to think this kind of life could get boring, but somehow it has.

 

“This guy have an actual name?” he asks, and Kinji seems to hesitate for a moment.

 

“I hear it’s Sendou,” he says. He licks his lips nervously. “Sendou Daiki.”

 

 _Oh_ , Hanzou thinks, and hates the way his heart seems to constrict. He hates himself even more when he feels a spark of hope flicker to life somewhere deep inside him. He’s supposed to be over this. He’s supposed to have moved on. And yet.

 

A new kid named Daiki. A new kid named Daiki, his age or at least close to it, who can hold his own in a fight both on and off the diorama.

 

Hanzou touches his wrist without meaning to.

 

“Yeah, okay,” he says softly. “I think I’ll go pay him a visit.”

 

.

 

.

 

He knows.

 

He knows as soon as he gets his first glimpse of Sendou Daiki’s face – those sharp eyes, those high cheekbones, that smug smile. Sometimes he catches his old man watching shitty soap operas, and they always describe the feeling of meeting one’s soulmate as a “sweet ache” or a “magnetic pull.” They always make it sound so fucking elegant. But in reality it’s more like an elbow to the solar plexus – sudden and intense, knocking the breath right from his lungs, knees gone weak beneath him.

 

And after that, of course, comes the anger. It clouds his vision. He doesn’t think. He _can’t_ think. He just runs up and throws a punch, putting all his strength behind it, a reckless jab with no real intended target. Daiki barely manages to sidestep, leaping backwards, settling immediately into a fighting stance, the expression on his face indescribable.

 

“What the fuck!?” he hisses.

 

Hanzou is breathing hard. _Where have you been,_ he wants to scream. _I’ve been waiting for you for so goddamn long._

 

But no, no, he swore to himself he was done with this. This “soulmates” bullshit. Because what is “fate,” really? Why does some name on his wrist get to dictate his life? He swore that he was done with Daiki – this person he’s hated for exactly six months and seven days, who only now has a face and a voice to go along with the name.

 

“You,” Hanzou says. His voice is shaky. He levels his bokken in Daiki’s direction, trying to keep his hands from trembling. “You’re the one calling himself the ‘Magician in the Box,’ right? I’m giving you a fair warning right now: get the fuck out. The Four Devas control this part of Misora. You cause trouble here again and you’re _dead_ , got that?”

 

Daiki looks at him carefully for a long moment, fingers flexing at his side, like he’s about to reach out and touch Hanzou. Like he’s about to close the distance between them and wrap his arms around him and never let go (or maybe Hanzou’s just projecting, because that’s what _he_ wants more than anything). But then the moment passes as quick as it came, his haughty smile falling back into place.

 

“Haa? Who the hell are you?” The glint in his eyes is almost cruel. “I’ll do as I damn well please. And I’d like to see you try to stop me.”

 

He turns with a ‘hmph,’ walking away before Hanzou can say another word. He rounds the corner without a backwards glance. His steps don’t even falter. And Hanzou feels, in this moment, like someone has cut him open and ripped his heart straight from his chest.

 

_Who the hell are you?_

 

As if he doesn’t know.

 

As if he has no earthly clue who Hanzou is.

 

And all the while Hanzou’s pulse is pounding lightning-quick, tapping out a three-beat rhythm in his ears that sounds suspiciously like “Da-i-ki.”

 

.

 

.

 

It’s extremely uncommon, but not unheard of, for someone to have a one-sided soulmate.

 

 _Seven known cases of this strange condition have been reported in the past two centuries,_ the Wikipedia article states. _In all of these cases, an individual has encountered their soulmate only to find a name that is not their own on the other’s arm. These individuals are destined to never have their true feelings returned. Four of the seven died from self-inflicted means shortly after meeting their unrequited loves, unable to cope with_ –

 

Hanzou slams his laptop shut and tosses it aside, feeling vaguely sick to his stomach. It shouldn’t matter, he tells himself. It shouldn’t matter if he’s some one-in-a-million freakshow, because he’s given up on this crap anyhow.

 

But it was so much easier to renounce the whole soulmates business before he met his own. For the past week he’s thought of Daiki almost constantly, drifting off in the middle of conversations, lying awake at night with images of those eyes, those hands, those lips running through his head. Hearing that voice asking _who the hell are you_ over and over again until there’s a scream building in his throat and he has to shove headphones on his ears, blasting music at a deafening decibel just to drown it out.

 

After two more days of this torture he’s beginning to understand why those people offed themselves.

 

“The hell are you doing, brat?” his old man says, when he comes home from work to find Hanzou lying face-down on the couch. “You sick or something? Don’t fucking tell me you played hooky again.”

 

Hanzou makes a muffled, noncommittal noise. He’s been on the couch all day long. His legs are starting to ache from restlessness. But the mere idea of getting up and _doing things_ is somehow even more unpleasant.

 

His old man shoves him over and sinks down next to him on the sofa, turning on the tv with a snap of his fingers. The local news is on – the tail-end of some story about a robbery in the shopping district.

 

“And now for our special weekly segment, Love Connect!, we go to lifestyle correspondent Kamiya Makoto, reporting live at Tokio Airport.”

 

The camera switches to the airport, where Kamiya Makoto is smiling in that wan, forced way that reporters often do. There’s a woman standing next to her, dark skin and deep, beautiful brown eyes, black hair swept back in a loose braid. Compared to Kamiya she looks genuinely happy, eager in a way that’s enviable, a broad grin making her cheeks dimple.

 

“Thank you, Yamada-san,” Kamiya says. “I’m here with Richa Jhaveri, age twenty-three, who just stepped off her plane from Bangalore and has a message she hopes will reach the right person.” She holds the microphone out to the woman, who grabs it from her hand enthusiastically.

 

“Kyouko!” she exclaims. Her eyes are shining. She holds up her wrist to the camera, where きょうこ is visible in bold black script. “Kyouko, it’s me! It’s Richa! I learned Japanese just for you! Please, Kyouko, if you see this, please come find me. I’m staying at the Hanada Inn on 4th Street. I saved up money for so long to come here. I want to meet you, Kyouko. I just want to see your face – ”

 

Hanzou swipes his hand hurriedly to the left, changing the channel before Richa can finish her spiel.

 

“Oi,” his old man mutters. “I was watchin’ that! Change it back; I don’t wanna miss the lotto numbers.”

 

But Hanzou isn’t listening. He hugs his knees to his chest, curling in upon himself, taking deep breaths in a vain attempt to calm down. Soulmate-seekers on the news aren’t a surprising thing. He’s seen them a thousand times before. But for some reason the desperate optimism in Richa Jhaveri’s eyes is actually, physically _hurting_ him – a full-body ache that starts in his chest and pulses out slow and agonizing to the tips of his fingers, the soles of his feet. This is what Daiki has done to him, he thinks. Turned him into a fucking wreck, a hollow shell of himself, a weak-hearted idiot who falls apart at the slightest provocation.

 

Later, when his old man’s gone out for drinks with his buddies, Hanzou punches a hole in his bedroom wall and doesn’t feel even the slightest hint of satisfaction.


End file.
